Women shouldn't be paid less than men [Speech]

This term, we had to write speeches, and as I couldn't put the doc itself onto the blog without looking stupid, I have the whole speech written here:

Envision Aotearoa 100 years ago: silent movies, no fast cars and no cell phones!
Now the absolute worst thing about 100 years ago is women were considered less than men. They were not allowed to work once they were married, in many couldn’t vote, or own a house.

1000 years ago, things were even worse!
In general, women were not respected and had few rights. Women were felt to be untrustworthy and more easily seduced by the devil than were men. Since women's intelligence was viewed to be not as good as that of men, their education was limited to learning the skills needed at home.

 But these are modern times when various laws and social customs say that everyone is equal. So why do women still get paid less than men?

In 2017, Dr Sin and her colleagues at the Motu Institute found that women in the same job, making the same value of the contribution to their employer in New Zealand were being paid 84 cents compared to every $1 a man earned. 16 cents doesn’t sound like a lot of money. But if you are earning the average weekly income of $1000 per week, that 16 cent difference all of a sudden becomes $160.

So how can this be?

In the past, women weren’t considered important in the workforce, so they were limited to only a few job opportunities. Until they were married they filled roles such as typists, nurses or teachers. The women's main job was to get married and have children, while it was the husband’s job to earn a living. So men tended to do the “more important”well-paid jobs, such as doctors, lawyers or business owners.

According to the Ministry For Women, these historical trends explain about 20% of the gender pay gap.

The other 80% of reasons come down to human behaviour, attitudes and bias. Even though there are plenty of laws that say women should not be discriminated against in the workforce, human behaviour takes longer to change. Some people still believe - whether they realise it or not - that some jobs are made for women and others for men. This sort of bias or favouritism can be really hard to detect. Sometimes it can be as simple as who gets asked first for opinions at meetings - the male boss is often more likely to ask the men in the meeting for their ideas first. This may not be intentional, it's just that people of the same gender are usually more in tune with each other, so are, therefore, more comfortable asking them first. This is not that different from when selected captains are asked to choose a team for sports. People are most likely to choose from within their group of friends first because this is who they are used to being around and they know them the best.

Another reason for this problem is that men and women tend to cluster into certain types of jobs. Women usually end up dominating careers that involve caring and unpaid work. For some reason, these jobs get paid less. Also, it is usually the woman who takes time out of her career to look after her children. So this lost work time also means lost experience, which can count against the woman when she is competing for a job against a male who has not taken time off work.

So should women be given the same amount of pay as men?

Of course, they should!

We all know that women are just as intelligent as men. They have the ability to cope under stress. They can work just as hard. They are more organised and have the ability to multi-task - usually better than men - to be honest about that one. Sometimes women might not be as physically strong as men, but in today's mechanised world this is not such an issue.

So, if we really want to reduce the gender pay gap in New Zealand, women need to make sure they make the most of the educational opportunities available to them. So they are able to compete on an equal footing with men for the more highly paid careers. They should also convince their husbands to take a more equal role in raising their family, so they don't fall behind as much when they take time out of the workforce.

So while our current laws are trying to encourage pay equity, I hope the change in people's attitudes keeps up. Then in the future, I will be able to be employed in a world, where I am able to work in the same career, doing the same thing with the same experience as a man, for the exact same pay.

Do you think women should be paid the same as men? Why?